For many of us, 2009 will be remembered as the year we spent feeling like so many salmon: Swimming upstream and hoping to remain uneaten by the bears along the way.
It’s December, people! We should be thinking about gathering with friends and family and celebrating the miracles that make this time of year so special.
December is a time traditionally devoted to contemplating the broader themes and overlays that weave the events of our lives together into a fabric. Maybe this qualifies — or maybe not — but lately, I’ve been thinking about our national journey into health care “reform” writ large. Unlike the rest of this past year, which I’ve spent focused on the mechanics, I have
been thinking instead about the discussion itself.
The early rounds of our “heavyweight battle” have been strikingly similar to Muhammad Ali’s 1974 “Rumble in the Jungle” bout against George Foreman. The first round was the customary practice of two veteran fighters taking the measure of each other. The second round, however, was anything but normal. Ali had warned his manager that he had a “special strategy” to use that would guarantee a defeat of the powerful Foreman.
At the beginning of round two, and continuing until round eight, Ali leaned against the ropes and protected himself against a barrage of punches from Foreman. When Foreman answered the bell for that eighth round, he was exhausted. Ali charged to the center of the ring and dropped Foreman to the canvas, winning the fight. Ali’s famous strategy became known as the “rope-a-dope.”
In round one of our bout, Congress and the White House began taking the measure of various industry segments. One by one, the pharmaceutical industry, the American Medical Association, and America’s Health Insurance Plans sparred with the political leadership as each tried to discern the strengths and weaknesses of their opponents’ positions. Then came round two and, Ali-like, a new strategy emerged. The Congressional rope-a-dope counted on letting opponents punch themselves into exhaustion against a plan that was as inaccessible to the public as Ali was to Foreman.
It began with the tea party protests and moved into the summer with angry town hall meetings. As the leadership of the legislative and executive branches had hoped, there were a lot of “Foremans” throwing a lot of “punches” that did little actual damage. This was unsurprising, given that they had done such a good job of hiding the actual target: Definitive legislative language.
By the “eighth round” (early in the fall), Congress was ready to step into the middle of the ring, as confident as was Ali that they could deliver a crushing blow and achieve a decisive victory. Sadly, the leadership miscalculated and the result (so far) has been a bit different than they had hoped. Worse for us all is that their miscalculation was quickly replaced with a new tactical approach: Vilify the very industries needed to achieve meaningful reform. After all, they were George Foreman. They were the ones who could deliver a crushingly powerful blow.
The vilification began with the insurance companies. It was swift and vicious. The attack was replete with half truths, misstatements and concocted facts. It began with President Obama’s Sept. 9 address to a joint session of Congress. He spoke about an Illinois man who “lost his coverage in the middle of chemotherapy because his insurer found he hadn’t reported gallstones that he didn’t even know about. They delayed his treatment and he died because of it.”
The only problem with this compelling story is that it omits a few key facts. On June 16, the man’s sister testified before the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigation of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce. She told the subcommittee the insurer reinstated her brother’s coverage following intervention by the Illinois Attorney General. Her brother received the stem cell transplant within the timeframe his doctors had requested. While the President’s account that the man had died was accurate, he somehow neglected to mention that the death came three and half years after the treatment.
The examples are as numerous and diverse as the industries that have come under the government’s withering attack. After the insurance companies, they vilified the tea party participants, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Catholic Church, Joe Wilson (though he made himself easy prey) and of course, the hated Fox News channel.
And don’t get me started about the President’s fellow Nobel Prize winner Jimmy Carter and his blanket condemnation of those who disagree with the President as doing so solely out of racism. It’s a good thing that it isn’t called the “noble” peace prize.
Father Jonathan Morris said of their attack on the Catholic Church: “They want silence and now they are going after the Catholic Church for speaking out.” House minority leader John Boehner was more succinct, “What they’re doing is flat out despicable.”
I’ve spent some time thinking about why such a diverse group has been subjected to this “despicable” level of vitriol. In a moment of stunning clarity, the answer became apparent. You can’t have victims without villains, and the kind of health care “reform” being offered by our government is most attractive to those who see themselves as such.
Victims are “entitled,” and what is being slowly rolled out of that magnificent building on The Hill is the single largest entitlement ever conceived. I wish it were about reforming health care, but there’s precious little in any of the legislation or rhetoric that addresses any significant changes to the actual cost drivers themselves.
It saddens me that we have missed any real opportunity to have a real discussion about real changes that would make the health care universe a better place. Worse, I fear that we may have turned a page that cannot be turned back. We may have lost our ability to have a constructive national conversation about much of anything at all.
If the audacity of hope has become the hope of audacity, we are in deep, deep trouble. If we are indeed on our way to becoming a nation of self-professed victims, all may indeed be lost for this great experiment of ours called The United States of America.
David Saltzman, RHU, DIA, is a past president of NAHU and has been a health, disability, life and employee benefits broker for more than 25 years. He is director of the large group segment for Carolina Care Plan. Readers may write to him at Carolina Care Plan Inc., 201 Executive Center Drive, Columbia, SC 29210.